1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to oral hygiene equipment, and more specifically to an improved dental flossing device.
2. Cross-Reference to Related Applications
This device is the subject of my design patent application, Ser. No. 06/765804, filed on 8/15/85, entitled DENTAL FLOSS HOLDER.
3. Description of the Prior Art
The dental profession has long recognized the benefits of regular use of dental floss in home dental care programs. Moreover, increasing public knowledge and concern about dental plaque build-up has made flossing a more routine and significant ritual in many households. Heretofore, people have either chosen one of many dental floss holding devices that have been previously known, or they hold and manuever the dental floss with their fingers. The latter procedure often involves wrapping the dental floss around the fingers, sometimes resulting in pain as flossing proceeds; the method of holding and manipulating dental floss with the fingers is also wasteful of flossing material, and is somewhat difficult, the degree of difficulty in part depending upon relative size of fingers and mouth, dexterity, and patience.
Various dental floss holders have been developed to facilitate holding and tensioning the dental floss, and to facilitate the urging of dental floss between the teeth. Some of the prior art dental floss holders necessitate that the manufacturer fabricate and assemble several differently shaped pieces, often resulting in a relatively high-cost device. Few such devices are commonly available in the marketplace at present, in spite of the fact that some of these devices theoretically use floss efficiently, and may have other advantages as well.
Other dental floss holders do not use commonly available dental floss material. These devices sometimes make efficient use of floss, but the floss is usually expensive and hard to find vis-a-vis that commonly available in drug stores.
In the prior art, dental floss holders of disposable design are disclosed. Some are of simple design, but are sometimes marginally effective in maneuverability and/or in maintaining tension when cleaning very many surfaces. Some lack the durability to clean many surfaces, and are costly over the long run if flossing is to be done between all teeth on a daily basis; reusable dental floss holders utilizing commonly available dental floss are often more cost effective.
Of the currently more popular reusable dental floss holders which are of low-cost construction, and which use commonly available dental floss, most have a pair of spaced arms at the end of a supporting handle. A length of dental floss is strung between the ends of the spaced arms which have floss-receiving notches at their terminal ends. The ends of the dental floss are secured in some fashion or another, generally either by winding around a button/protrusion on the handle, or pulling the ends of the dental floss into inwardly tapered notches of frictional securing slots on the handle. These dental floss holders have had only limited success commercially for any number of reasons, often including inadequate securing and/or tensioning of the dental floss and/or a design not easily maneuvered in the back of the mouth, and/or a design wasteful of dental floss, and/or a design with too much bulk and discomfort in use. Among designs which may be wasteful of dental floss are those with only a short span (typically 1.5 to 2.0 cm), of taut dental floss between the spaced arms of a strung system; this usable length of taut dental floss often comprises less than 10% of the total length of dental floss necessary to string and secure the dental floss on the holder. Such designs, with 1.5 to 2.0 cm or so of usable dental floss between the spaced arms, are also often among those designs considered difficult to maneuver--particularly in breaking through tight interproximal contacts. Such a short span of usable dental floss generally precludes adequate performance of a gentle "sawing" motion, and the "brute force" pressure therefore applied to break through these tight contacts sometimes results in cutting the gums, or in losing tension in the dental floss, or in fraying or breaking the dental floss.
In some of the prior art dental floss holders, an already short useable length of taut dental floss is, in effect, further shortened in use due to sometimes inadequate distances, perpendicularly, between a locus of points along the span of taut dental floss and the nearest surface of the supporting member or frame. In such designs, a back-and-forth sawing motion to the gumline between elongated teeth may be possibly only over a limited portion of the short span of taut dental floss, because of significant interference from the supporting member of frame. Other parts of the frame of bulky and/or awkwardly shaped dental floss holders still further limit maneuverability of some devices in the mouth, particularly the ability to perform a relatively long back-and-forth motion between all teeth. The result is that the central portions of the usable length of taut dental floss tend to get more use, and it often frays or breaks quickly in such designs.
Some prior art dental floss holders which use commonly available dental floss material require tie-down, knotting, loop-making, or other special treatment of one of both of the dental floss ends. Such dental floss holders are not commonly available in the marketplace at present.